Ok, so is Jon Battleborn a ghost?

If you talk (or at least she talks to you) yo the battleborn farmer, she tells you that her brother, jon, is right to avoid the war and go to the bard's college, but he's one of the ones you can get the initual companions quest from. This makes me think he's a ghost, but every other ghost is translucent and blue. Is he dead? Is he not?